Premature Birth

Joe Szot established this new line right of Mid-Life Crisis just before the sixth annual Adirondack MountainFest. With little ice around Joe was definitely working out side the box, or in his case shall we say the cage. He and Ian Boyer rappelled down to the ledge for the first ascent of “Premature Birth” WI5, M6. Midlife Crisis, another Szot test piece to the left was first established in this same way since the ice rarely reaches the ground. True to form Joe gave it what I believe is an understated rating of WI5, M6. On Friday Jim Shimberg and Will Mayo cleaned up the line by climbing the first pitch of Discord and then used the Garter traverse to reach the climb. Shimberg said “it felt like we were climbing 5.12, the gear was truck! What a great climb”.

Photo: Premature Birth is the broken ice line on the right – Photo by Doug Millen